Six Smart Women Discussing Doctor Who

The onslaught of new Doctor Who continues with a much-needed romp. Join Deb, Erika, Katrina, and Liz as we find out who enjoys joy and who has a cold, black, grumpy fangirl heart. We also check in on how an under-the-weather Liz has been feeling about Capaldi!Doctor. Plus, we announce a giveaway! Lots of fun stuff this week!

What did you think of this lighthearted episode? Did it make you laugh and cheer? Or did you shake your head and roll your eyes? Let us know in the comments! (Reminder: we’ve created a separate post for contest entries, so please go there and leave a comment to enter!)

Comments on: "Verity! Episode 51 – Robot of Sure Would/n’t" (53)

I don’t mind silly. I love silly. ’The Unicorn and the Wasp’ is one of my favourites. But I don’t seem to like Mark Gatiss’ ‘Doctor Who’ in general. ’The Unquiet Dead’ is good. I can sort of see why people like ’The Crimson Horror’ even while I don’t. ‘An Adventure In Space and Time’ was great. ‘Sherlock’ is brilliant. Most of his ‘Doctor Who’ work strikes me as decidedly middling or worse however and ‘Robot of Sherwood’ does nothing to improve his average in my book. Silly ‘Doctor Who’ is great, this just didn’t work for me.

I have two specific problems in no particular order:

1. Yes, Nottingham is unusually warm and sunny. Global warming? Well, yes. Actually. The story is set squarely during the medieval warm period, the warm spell that among other things enabled farming on freaking Greenland. Go ahead and mention how Nottingham seems too pleasant in a suspicious way or whatever but don’t dismiss a climatic explanation with the line “It’s 1190” since 1190’s north atlantic had unusually warm climate. Better yet make the mystery something other than how unseasonably warm it is.

2. Goodness gracious. Maid Marian spends the episode as a complete damsel in distress and ends up referred to as a “present” gifted by the Doctor to Robin Hood. Seriously? The character does up the number of women in the story to 2, a whopping 100 % increase over Clara alone, but that’s if one wants to argue that the scant outline of a character should even count. It might have been better if Marian wasn’t included at all.

3. And apparently the space ship somehow runs on gold, gold in the general vicinity even and not necessarily in any particular reactor or anything, and that can somehow penetrate the hull of the ship when in arrow form. Gold. The soft basic metal. That they left vats of behind when they took off in spite of needing a handful more of to successfully take off.

4. And what do you mean “a miniscope, of course!” What if anything would make you think that it’s a goddamned miniscope? What? Oh, it’s just an excuse to reference an old story? OK. Fine. Next time try to do in a way that doesn’t make the main protagonist look like he has only experienced his past adventures through reading the keywords or tags from the plot synopsises.

5. Wow. Aren’t those tired and starved medieval peasants good at aiming spacey energy blast ricochets with uneven dinner plates? While the robots are rubbish at aiming their actual blasters at the peasants. I admit that at this point in the episode they’d lost me a long time ago but please. They all stand in a circle with serving trays or something and one blast bounces between all of them at just the right angles to keep bouncing until it smacks into the robot who fired it? Is that bit supposed to be funny? Is it a joke that they’re able to keep the freaking blast bouncing between them without hitting the floor or the ceiling or someone’s foot or face?

OK. Those are five things. I accidentally made a list of complaints. I’m now officially a bad fan.

It’s a terrible episode and I am getting more upset and finding more flaws the longer I write this.

Even the things that I would like in principle, if one were to give a list of things and moments to be included in the script were someone to write it, just don’t ever work for me. The potentially poignant conversation between the Doctor and Robin at the end about living up to one’s legend vacillated between being entirely too serious and profound for the episode it’s in and being so self aware and winking at the audience that it pushes the silly into ‘The Feast of Steven’ territory.
I hope a historical climatologist could weigh in on the climate matter and hopefully prove the episode’s take on medieval British climate correct but even if the Doctor is valid in his scoffing at the suggestion of “global warming” it doesn’t really fix my overriding problem with the story.
It’s not that I’m just taking a stupid silly “romp” of an episode too seriously, I love silly romps like ‘Partners In Crime’ or even ’The Romans’ and ’The Gunfighters’, but when the silly romp spends two thirds of the episode inviting the audience to question its validity and has a discussion within it about known historical facts as part of the characters trying to figure out the supposed puzzle then, no, I am going to struggle to just ignore and go along with it. The very first scene in which the Doctor does battle with Robin Hood is fun though. I’ll give the episode that. It is a whimsical scene, just stupid enough but everyone in it appears to, at least for the moment, take it seriously and all the bits in it add up to a believable if improbable whole. Also Ben Miller was great as was this take on the Sheriff of Nottingham and he elevated every scene he was in.
I do very much like that they cut the bit about the Sheriff being a robot. That’s a good thing. Let the Sheriff and Robin be “real” and on equal-ish footing. Maybe they should have also just removed the line about being half man and half engine in post.

I apologise if all of this is covered in the podcast episode, I’m still listening to it, but I had to get this out somewhere and the Verity comments section seemed like a fine place to do it.

Sorry.

So far, 39 minutes in, Erika seems to be the one with the most correct opinions this week. Well done Erika.

I’m not a historical climatologist but I’ll try to elucidate a bit. One of the leading theories on the Medieval Warm Period is that it was caused by unusually high levels of solar radiation during the time which links into the Doctor mentioning the spaceship leaking radiation into the atmosphere.

There was also several studies suggesting that the Medieval Warm Period was localised to an around the North Atlantic Ocean so the phenomenon couldn’t be connected to global warming.

It’s worth noting that this all being based on indirect data and often used as a big piece in the global warming debate so there’s lots of contradictory studies that are probably quite bias.

For whatever it may be worth, Henrik, perhaps the Doctor knew Clara meant “global warming” in her (and ours) own, early 21st-century context — i.e., post-Industrial Age climate change — and just didn’t want to get into the details.

As you were talking about the Sheriff being a robot, I kept on thinking ‘Where the hell did they say that?’ It is a twist that completely flew over my head and was not well expressed at all with only a line and a weird image to reveal it. While I can understand why they cut that scene, it sounded like it made that twist very clear and makes that part of the plot confusing with its absence. Personally, the whole episode was so silly (and, thankfully, most of the time it was enjoyably silly) and fantastical in its tone, the beheading would probably have been seen with that tone in mind, especially if it as you guys described it with talking heads and whathaveyou.

While I’m talking about the edit, Mickelah, a fantastic YouTuber who does reviews of Doctor Who who you should definitely watch, made an interesting point in his review of ‘Robot of Sherwood’ (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdHOFe2UV-4&list=UUh_lb6HM_lkOcCMf-4IHdkg) about the way the BBC’s announcement of the cut was almost a form of publicity which made him uncomfortable.

This was nice froth, although it will undoubtedly be criticised as a filler episode especially as the reference to the Promised Land and the Doctor and Robin’s conversation at the end felt really tacked on. Robin was written and performed as such a caricature that he wasn’t convincing as a real person – the odd line about sad eyes wasn’t enough. Nevertheless, it was there, if buried by the humour, and maybe that was the point – ‘I’m as real as you are’ and the constant addressing of how it is hard to distinguish reality from fiction means that we’re meant to be suspicious of Robin and then reassess our view once we learn the truth. As I write this, I realise that I think I need to watch this again.

For now though, it was some silly fun that is my least favourite episode so far this series, although I doubt that is the end of silliness since we’ve got ‘Mummy on the Orient Express’ in October…

My only real problem with the episode was the gold-arrow-makes-the-spaceship-go-further solution. I know we have to accept that there will be solutions to problems that are based upon science we don’t understand and I can handle that (except, sometimes, when the sonic screwdriver acts as the deus ex machina) … but this just hit me as an unfortunate random throw-away that made no sense whatsoever. And never will …

Other than that, much fun romping … with just enough serious character development for The Doctor. A chance to relax a little between the darkness of episodes 1 & 2 and the presumable darkness of 4!

The news story going on about half of Norse warriors being women was factually incorrect and misinterpreted the study. The study found that out of the 13 remains of settlers they sexed they found six to be women.

They also talked about how testing remains instead of making presumptions based on artifacts is how they’ve removed bias giving the example of finding female Norse warriors.

It’s still an important study in that it means the first wave of settlers were half women instead of a men going first to establish a colony with the women coming over later but it has no bearing on the gender composition of their warriors.

The idea that female knights are historically inaccurate is still horribly ignorant but it’s based on the slew of other evidence like the Order of the Hatchet not this study.

On a side note a Viking is a member of an expeditionary force that often involved raiding it’s not the name of a society and should be Norse, Northmen or Varangians…. I should also mention that I really liked the episode and definitely fall within the mighty realm of Capaldi.

There are times to view an episode critically….and there are times to sit back and enjoy the popcorn. I thought that this was one of the latter. I loved every minute of this delicious “Men in Tights meets Pirates of the Caribbean” confection. That said…

I really liked the way the Doctor was a fine mixture of disbelieving and exasperated and I didn’t see him as petulant at all.

The nods to the 1935 Errol Flynn Robin Hood were scrumptious, starting with Tom Riley’s wonderfully Flynnish stance at the very beginning and going on through all the oh-so-merry men, who erupted in choruses of laughter every time someone made a joke. Of course, this lacked the 1935 film’s trio of miscreants — Claude Rains, Basil Rathbone, and Melville Cooper — so there was no comic foil among the bad guys.) Riley’s jerkin was a great sendup of Kevin Costner’s costume, too — except that it was green like Flynn’s (but unlike Flynn, he wasn’t wearing actual tights and he had no sequins).

No one seems to have mentioned that the spoon was a two-fer. There’s the Who-ish reference to Sylvester McCoy, and also a nod to Alan Rickman saying at one point that he was going to cut out Robin Hood’s heart with a spoon. “Why?” “Because it’s dull; it will hurt more, you twit!” I’m sure Ben Miller looks like The Master, a part of Classic Who I don’t know very well, but he looked an awful lot like Brian Blessed (Robin’s father in Prince of Thieves) to me.

And the episode was blessedly Missy-free.

And Clara totally rocked that dress (which may not be that hard to make for cosplay).

Finally: does anyone know whether the Patrick Troughton Robin of Sherwood has survived?

I believe that the BBC did not use videotape back in the 1950’s, and Troughton’s Robin Hood show was being aired live. There’s an amusing story Troughton told about how they used rear projection for the scenes in Sherwood Forest and that one time during transmission, someone put the slide in wrong and all the trees were upside down.

I agree, lbphilly, not petulant, this Doctor. For all that the episode is a romp (and I loved it), it shows the Doctor has a quite serious problem. I think all his statements about hating Robin Hood’s laughter are more than hyperbole; I think he really means it. He is a man (for the time being) without laughter and without joy. Capaldi plays this “pre-frowned face” Doctor very well. I do hope, though, that part of his arc this season (these seasons?) will be learning to laugh again.

I loved it. Really absolutely adored it. I wrote a full blog about it over on my Patient Centurion blog, which I would link to but can’t seem to at the moment. If you really want to read it then googling Patient Centurion should do it.

But it was nice just to have some fun for a change rather than be weighed down with baggage.

I’m with Liz on this one, I thought it was delightful. I really enjoyed the Doctor trying to disprove Robin Hood’s existence nearly until the end. He was snarky, and the episode was silly, and I utterly adored it. But a friend of mine came over to watch, and she was rolling her eyes most of the way through, so I’m not surprised that not everyone was digging the goofy vibe.

I’m so glad Deb noticed Clara’s hair change as well. I was jealous the entire episode.

Incidentally, I believe that we as a fandom (including myself) are awfully close to overusing the word “romp” to describe these episodes. After it ended, I immediately told my family “this one will be described in every review as a ‘romp'”, and it has been. The word is approaching “moist” levels of distaste for me. Lark or frolic would both be acceptable substitutes. 😛

Liz is a martyr to the Verity! cause. Begone, tonsilitis. A lovely episode (two lovely episodes) and my reservations (about Robot of Sherwood) arose from how I identified with the Doctor and at the same time disagreed with his prejudice. I am still working this out…

I’m still working this one out as well. I liked the premise, I laughed out loud more times than in possibly any episode ever, but I struggled to enjoy it overall for many of the reasons that Erika described (Erika, like Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman, is on fire this season!).

There were some choices in the direction that threw me out of the story, and they can be summed up in the word ‘bantering’. Much of this was directorial choice I think, allowing scenes like the dungeon one to go beyond snark to reach panto-level histrionics. In addition a writing choice that rubbed the wrong way was the Doctor’s direct reference to bantering. It was too broad a wink for me!

All that said, there were some very interesting ideas about reality and fiction and heroism that I thought were well worth exploring. Someone program this as a double feature with The Mind Robber!

And now, my aside of the week: How hard is it to wait for the Verity! episodes to drop before commenting? Here in Oz they don’t land until very late Wednesday night. I’d suggest opening up the page for comment in advance, but perhaps the opportunity for us to reflect – and rewatch – is part of what makes this discussion work.

I LOVE THIS EPISODE UNRESERVEDLY! Well, except for the magic golden arrow bit, but I can explain it away without much difficulty. I do prefer it with the cut scene still in, though I understand cutting it. But the dungeon scene, the archery competition, the sword fights – it was all a terrific, well-written lark, extraordinarily fun, and my favorite episode in several seasons. There was physical comedy, but I never thought it got into slapstick territory. There was a plot, and a theme, and Robin Hood! Love love loved it 🙂

I lvoed this episode. Part of it may be the fact that I am an unrepentant Mark Gatiss fangirl (yes, I even enjoy Victory of the Daleks :P). Part of it may also be that when it comes to Robin Hood, I like it silly. My favourite version is Men in Tights and the other one I own is the Disney version with foxes (the church mice, OMG!). So this was right up my alley.

I love that Clara continues to be awesome. I loved the interrogation scene (which also kinda made me want Clara/Sherriff fic *gulps*). I also loved the Sherriff, particularly once I figure out it was Ben Miller (it took a minute – to me he will always be James Lester).

On another note – I am so on Deb’s side about next week. That is one of my actual childhood nightmares (thank you so much Round the Twist *eyeroll*). I used to leap in and out of bed for quite a while. It will probably not help that I will likely be watching it on the iPad – in bed… Oh dear…

Elanor, I think “Victory of the Daleks” is much underrated! “I don’t care if you’re a machine, Bacewell – are you a man?” A fine episode about choosing who we want to be. (In a way, then, thematically similar to “Robot of Sherwood”!)

It was so nice to have an episode I could watch with my youngest kid, and I hooted at much of a dialogue. Gatiss is clearly a fan of the campy Errol Flynn movies, a few homage moments in here. It is nice to have a fun episode.

As for the comments about the lack of sense with the golden arrow etc, maybe just try to suspend your disbelief a wee bit higher for this episode 😉 It definitely does not reward overthinking.

My children’s love of this episode made me forgive all the bits I myself didn’t like (I loved bits unconditionally and hated other bits) – the 5 year old couldn’t cope with the Dalek one the week before and both of them said ‘hell no’ when they saw the preview for Listen. This is the one they will watch and rewatch over and over again from this season, so I am working really hard to not dwell on the negatives cos I know I’ll have to see it a zillion times. Like that bloody pirate episode, which is their FAVOURITE of season 6…

All the Robin Hood and Jon Pertwee jokes were definitely worth the price of admission.

My son is 13, and he didn’t even stay in the room during that whole preview – a few seconds in, and he was out! (I hope to convince him that “Listen” didn’t turn out to be nearly the terror-fest the trailer made it seem it would be.)

Can you clue a relative Who newbie in (I came aboard with Matt & Karen in 2010): What were the Pertwee jokes?

Listening to this now, but had to pause to tell Deb that my husband and I definitely noticed Clara’s longer hair as well (in curls, no less — her hair was straight at the beginning!). In fact, my husband noticed it first, but then he said the same thing in ‘Deep Breath’ when Clara comes out the next morning in Victorian garb and has her hair in an up-do with long ringlets there as well.

Maybe she keeps extension clip-ins on the TARDIS or in her purse? And/or maybe the wardrobe exists in a pocket dimension where she can take all the time she needs to get ready without it seeming like a long time? That wouldn’t explain her hair in ‘Deep Breath’, but my fanon is that someone who worked in the house helped her with her hair or something.

I choose to believe that she either has a robot hairdresser in the TARDIS, or the hair equivalent of the old food machine. Nano-hair. Viral wigs. The funny thing about her hair in Deep Breath is that she meets Jenny (the only “maid” in the house) coming up the stairs which basically suggests the only person available to fix Clara’s hair in that episode was Strax. HEAD CANON ACCEPTED.

If he can do the medical checks he can damn well do a french braid, not to mention wield the ringlet iron. I bet he’s been hanging out for months hoping for a chance to use the ringlet iron. Jenny’s lack of ringlets makes him sad.

I fell on the side of really enjoying this episode, but I could understand how it might be too silly for some. Still, one thing I thought of while you all were discussing the episode was how it fit into the season, and comparing it to how past seasons have handled arc-heavy vs. stand alone episodes. What immediately came to mind was just how AWFUL going straight from the implosion of baby Melody Pond to “Curse of the Black Spot” was. It made me really appreciate this episodes silliness even more – because it worked so much better than the wacky pirate episode. I wonder how that one might have been if Twelve had been the doctor on that romp??

I loved this episode and yes it was a break from the seriousness of the previous weeks. I love when Doctor Who goes whimsical. When he started taking samples from Robin and his men – telling Will or Allenadale that he’d be dead in 6 months – it was hilarious! The arrow splitting arrows splitting scene had the right amount of silly until even the Doctor decided it was enough and blew up the target. And then the way he sheepishly had to admit in the end that he cheated with his archery skills…. Beautiful!

I know some fans had problems with some of the facts as presented in the story but this is Doctor Who and you have to suspend belief at some point if you believe that there is a 2000 year old man travelling thru time and space in a police box.

On the subject of Missy… I was very glad not to see her in this ep; that would have been too much. However I was pleased that the topic was not altogether dropped. Against my better judgement I’m interested in where it’s going. Against my better judgement, because I lack faith in Moffat’s ability to deliver.

Loved this episode to bits. For me, it was very much a sit back, relax, and have a grand old time watching Doctor Who. After the heaviness in tone I found the slightly silly, bantery nature of this one refreshing. And like Clara, this Robin Hood was straight out of my childish fantasies (I’m a huge fan of the Disney Robin Hood).

I’m afraid I’ve moved firmly into the “Capaldi can do no wrong as The Doctor” camp with Liz and Kat so my judgement is tinged with all sorts of bias. That being said, I felt he was truly wonderful with being the irascible scientist. He beat Robin Hood with a SPOON! I thought he was so brilliant and funny and I love what he does with just a glance or his tone of voice.

Since I’m now just gushing, I’ll wrap up with my agreement with Erika. Not every episode will be geared towards me – like next weeks Listen – and I can see why some don’t like this one. But to me this was truly great Doctor Who.

Re the bickering between The Doctor and Robin Hood: I’m surprised that no one took up a comparison to the Ninth Doctor. His competitiveness with Captain Jack was from the same vein. I could totally see Ecchelson pulling off tha dungeon scene virtually note for note (& yes, Rose having to yell “shut up” in a far less commanding tone.)

Something I haven’t seen discussed anywhere is a Danny Pink / Harry Sullivan connection. Back in 1974 Harry was introduced as an action character to what was initially planned to be an older less active Doctor. Ultimately, the virile Tom was cast and Harry became redundant as the action hero and was sadly discarded (would I be banned from posting if I wished that they had kept Harry and lost Sarah Jane?). Skip forward to the present and we see a genuinely mature Doctor who is untested on the audiences and whom the BBC might feel is less capable in the heroic role. I cannot help but think that someone at the BBC Human Resources or Health and Safety department phoned up Steve Moffat and quietly requested a gung-ho action man be kept waiting in the wings in case there was a sudden slipped disk or physicality requirement that might be beyond the mighty Cap gun.

I’ve loved the little we have seen of Danny so far, he seems to be a genuinely interesting companion-in-waiting but I cannot help but get the whiff of a Stephen Taylor / Ben Jackson about how physical he is being portrayed as.

I’m sure that he’s cast to contrast the doctor but from what I’ve seen so far I don’t think it’s for the actiony stuff as much as for the emotional stuff.

Maybe I’m partial to the fact that I think Capaldi can do no wrong but I can definitely seeing him in a heroic role. On the other hand this is the first doctor in a while who isn’t emotional, both 10 and 11 were perceived as very empathic. I can see how the top can feel a bit like this is rocking the both a bit too much and wanting to include someone who’s a bit more in touch with his feelings. Then again, contrast Danny with how they portrayed Rory and I’m pretty sure that he’ll get to do some action stuff as well. Just look how that man is built. Maybe I’m just hoping that they’ll give him enough qualities to keep him around even if 12 can hold his own.

I loved Robot of Sherwood. Yes, it was light and silly, but that’s OK. It came at the perfect time for me. I know some people have issues with the arrow scene at the end. By that time I was having so much fun I didn’t care and just let it wash over me.

I enjoyed the podcast. Well done! You all will be happy to know that you accompanied me on a rainy, cold run in the northern Michigan forest not too unlike Sherwood forest while I listened. Hope Liz is feeling better.

I’m with Erika this week. I get that they needed to lighten things up, but it was a bit too cheesy for my taste. Some good moments, but overall, it missed the mark. Not the worst episode by any means, but not my favorite. One moment I did absolutely love was at the end when he bit into the apple, paused, sonic-ed it, then kind of shrugged. 11 said apples were rubbish, but new mouth, new rules.

Wow, I almost didn’t listen to the podcast this week because of the title: Robot of Sure Would/n’t. I thought it was going to be more slagging off on one of the best Doctor Who episodes in years. I was surprised only one person didn’t like it. I’m not a newbie, I watch Classic and New Who, I read the books, listen to Big Finish, I felt it was nice to just enjoy myself. Sure there were squiffy plot points, but who cares?

The “half engine, half man” bit was a little confusing but later when I saw the edited footage it made perfect sense. Maid Marian was obviously inside the TARDIS somewhere and materialized when the TARDIS left. And yeah, arrow to the spaceship was pushing it but the beauty of the teamwork pushed any doubts out of my head.

I didn’t think about it but whoever said Clara was faking being unconscious is absolutely right. She enjoyed every second of it.

Honestly, I didn’t get pulled out by anything in this episode because I like to have fun and this was pure, unadulterated fun. It was the first episode this season that I rewatched IMMEDIATELY after the first viewing. And it was FUNNER! I’m going to go watch it again and I bet you it’ll be FUNNEST of all!!!

I could tell while I was watching that this one would divide fan opinion, but I loved every second of it. I think it’s my favourite episode of this season so far. 🙂

I should have known Capaldi could take this stuff in his stride, but I was pleasantly surprised by how well his Doctor fits into a more humorous episode. Tonally, I suspect this one will be the odd man out for this season but I hope we get more romps in the not too distant future because I thought it was an utterly delightful 45 minutes.

The divided response to this one reminds me of how ‘A Town Called Mercy’ was received. In that case, if you loved westerns (particularly spaghetti westerns) as I do, then you were likely to eat the episode up with a spoon. In this case, I think a love of old school swashbucklers definitely helps one to appreciate the rompiness.